HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Punishment, commonly, is the imposition of an undesirable or unpleasant outcome upon a group or individual, meted out by an
authority In the fields of sociology and political science, authority is the legitimate power of a person or group over other people. In a civil state, ''authority'' is practiced in ways such a judicial branch or an executive branch of government.''T ...
—in contexts ranging from
child discipline Child discipline is the methods used to prevent future unwanted behaviour in children. The word ''discipline'' is defined as imparting knowledge and skill, in other words, to teach. In its most general sense, discipline refers to systematic ins ...
to
criminal law Criminal law is the body of law that relates to crime. It prescribes conduct perceived as threatening, harmful, or otherwise endangering to the property, health, safety, and moral welfare of people inclusive of one's self. Most criminal law ...
—as a response and deterrent to a particular action or
behavior Behavior (American English) or behaviour (British English) is the range of actions and mannerisms made by individuals, organisms, systems or artificial entities in some environment. These systems can include other systems or organisms as we ...
that is deemed undesirable or unacceptable. It is, however, possible to distinguish between various different understandings of what punishment is. The reasoning for punishment may be to condition a child to avoid self-endangerment, to impose social
conformity Conformity is the act of matching attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors to group norms, politics or being like-minded. Norms are implicit, specific rules, shared by a group of individuals, that guide their interactions with others. People often cho ...
(in particular, in the contexts of
compulsory education Compulsory education refers to a period of education that is required of all people and is imposed by the government. This education may take place at a registered school or at other places. Compulsory school attendance or compulsory schooling ...
or
military discipline Military justice (also military law) is the legal system (bodies of law and procedure) that governs the conduct of the active-duty personnel of the armed forces of a country. In some nation-states, civil law and military law are distinct bodie ...
), to defend norms, to protect against future harms (in particular, those from
violent crime A violent crime, violent felony, crime of violence or crime of a violent nature is a crime in which an offender or perpetrator uses or threatens to use harmful force upon a victim. This entails both crimes in which the violent act is the objecti ...
), and to maintain the
law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...
—and respect for
rule of law The rule of law is the political philosophy that all citizens and institutions within a country, state, or community are accountable to the same laws, including lawmakers and leaders. The rule of law is defined in the ''Encyclopedia Britannic ...
—under which the social group is governed. and violates the law or rules by which the group is governed. Punishment may be self-inflicted as with
self-flagellation Self-flagellation is the disciplinary and devotional practice of flogging oneself with whips or other instruments that inflict pain. In Christianity, self-flagellation is practiced in the context of the doctrine of the mortification of the fle ...
and
mortification of the flesh Mortification of the flesh is an act by which an individual or group seeks to mortify or deaden their sinful nature, as a part of the process of sanctification. In Christianity, mortification of the flesh is undertaken in order to repent for ...
in the religious setting, but is most often a form of social
coercion Coercion () is compelling a party to act in an involuntary manner by the use of threats, including threats to use force against a party. It involves a set of forceful actions which violate the free will of an individual in order to induce a des ...
. The unpleasant imposition may include a fine,
penalty Penalty or The Penalty may refer to: Sports * Penalty (golf) * Penalty (gridiron football) * Penalty (ice hockey) * Penalty (rugby) * Penalty (rugby union) * Penalty kick (association football) * Penalty shoot-out (association football) * Penal ...
, or
confinement Confinement may refer to * With respect to humans: ** An old-fashioned or archaic synonym for childbirth ** Postpartum confinement (or postnatal confinement), a system of recovery after childbirth, involving rest and special foods ** Civil confi ...
, or be the removal or denial of something pleasant or desirable. The individual may be a person, or even an animal. The authority may be either a group or a single person, and punishment may be carried out formally under a system of
law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...
or informally in other kinds of social settings such as within a family. Negative consequences that are not authorized or that are administered without a breach of rules are not considered to be punishment as defined here. The study and practice of the punishment of
crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in C ...
s, particularly as it applies to imprisonment, is called
penology Penology (from "penal", Latin '' poena'', "punishment" and the Greek suffix '' -logia'', "study of") is a sub-component of criminology that deals with the philosophy and practice of various societies in their attempts to repress criminal activiti ...
, or, often in modern texts,
corrections In criminal justice, particularly in North America, correction, corrections, and correctional, are umbrella terms describing a variety of functions typically carried out by government agencies, and involving the punishment, treatment, and s ...
; in this context, the punishment process is euphemistically called "correctional process". Research into punishment often includes similar research into prevention. Justifications for punishment include retribution, deterrence,
rehabilitation Rehabilitation or Rehab may refer to: Health * Rehabilitation (neuropsychology), therapy to regain or improve neurocognitive function that has been lost or diminished * Rehabilitation (wildlife), treatment of injured wildlife so they can be retur ...
, and incapacitation. The last could include such measures as isolation, in order to prevent the wrongdoer's having contact with potential victims, or the removal of a hand in order to make theft more difficult. If only some of the conditions included in the definition of punishment are present, descriptions other than "punishment" may be considered more accurate. Inflicting something negative, or unpleasant, on a person or animal, without authority is considered
revenge Revenge is committing a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance, be it real or perceived. Francis Bacon described revenge as a kind of "wild justice" that "does... offend the law ndputteth the law out of office." P ...
or spite rather than punishment. In addition, the word "punishment" is used as a metaphor, as when a boxer experiences "''punishment''" during a fight. In other situations, breaking a rule may be rewarded, and so receiving such a reward naturally does not constitute punishment. Finally the condition of breaking (or breaching) the rules must be satisfied for consequences to be considered punishment. Punishments differ in their degree of severity, and may include sanctions such as
reprimands A reprimand is a severe, formal or official reproof. Reprimanding takes in different forms in different legal systems. A reprimand in custody may be a formal legal action issued by a government agency or professional governing board (e.g. medical ...
, deprivations of privileges or
liberty Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom. In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society fr ...
, fines,
incarceration Imprisonment is the restraint of a person's liberty, for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is " false imprisonment". Imprisonment does not necessar ...
s,
ostracism Ostracism ( el, ὀστρακισμός, ''ostrakismos'') was an Athenian democratic procedure in which any citizen could be expelled from the city-state of Athens for ten years. While some instances clearly expressed popular anger at the ci ...
, the infliction of
pain Pain is a distressing feeling often caused by intense or damaging stimuli. The International Association for the Study of Pain defines pain as "an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with, or resembling that associated with, ...
,
amputation Amputation is the removal of a limb by trauma, medical illness, or surgery. As a surgical measure, it is used to control pain or a disease process in the affected limb, such as malignancy or gangrene. In some cases, it is carried out on indi ...
and the
death penalty Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that ...
. '' Corporal punishment'' refers to punishments in which physical pain is intended to be inflicted upon the transgressor. Punishments may be judged as fair or unfair in terms of their degree of reciprocity and proportionality to the offense. Punishment can be an integral part of socialization, and punishing unwanted behavior is often part of a system of
pedagogy Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken ...
or behavioral modification which also includes rewards.


Definitions

There are a large number of different understandings of what punishment is.


In philosophy

Various philosophers have presented definitions of punishment. Conditions commonly considered necessary properly to describe an action as punishment are that # it is imposed by an authority (single or multiple), # it involves some loss to the supposed offender, # it is in response to an offense and # the human (or other animal) to whom the loss is imposed should be deemed at least somewhat responsible for the offense.


In psychology

Introduced by
B.F. Skinner Burrhus Frederic Skinner (March 20, 1904 – August 18, 1990) was an American psychologist, behaviorist, author, inventor, and social philosopher. He was a professor of psychology at Harvard University from 1958 until his retirement in 1974. C ...
, punishment has a more restrictive and technical definition. Along with
reinforcement In behavioral psychology, reinforcement is a consequence applied that will strengthen an organism's future behavior whenever that behavior is preceded by a specific antecedent stimulus. This strengthening effect may be measured as a higher fr ...
it belongs under the
operant conditioning Operant conditioning, also called instrumental conditioning, is a learning process where behaviors are modified through the association of stimuli with reinforcement or punishment. In it, operants—behaviors that affect one's environment—are c ...
category. Operant conditioning refers to learning with either punishment (often confused as negative reinforcement) or a reward that serves as a positive reinforcement of the lesson to be learned. In psychology, punishment is the reduction of a behavior via application of an unpleasant stimulus ("''positive'' punishment") or removal of a pleasant stimulus ("''negative'' punishment"). Extra chores or
spanking Spanking is a form of corporal punishment involving the act of striking, with either the palm of the hand or an implement, the buttocks of a person to cause physical pain. The term spanking broadly encompasses the use of either the hand or im ...
are examples of positive punishment, while removing an offending student's recess or play privileges are examples of negative punishment. The definition requires that punishment is only determined after the fact by the reduction in behavior; if the offending behavior of the subject does not decrease, it is not considered punishment. There is some
conflation Conflation is the merging of two or more sets of information, texts, ideas, opinions, etc., into one, often in error. Conflation is often misunderstood. It originally meant to fuse or blend, but has since come to mean the same as equate, treati ...
of punishment and
aversives In psychology, aversives are unpleasant stimuli that induce changes in behavior via negative reinforcement or positive punishment. By applying an aversive immediately before or after a behavior the likelihood of the target behavior occurring in th ...
, though an aversion that does not decrease behavior is not considered punishment in psychology. Additionally, "aversive stimulus" is a label behaviorists generally apply to negative reinforcers (as in avoidance learning), rather than the punishers.


In socio-biology

Punishment is sometimes called '' retaliatory'' or ''
moralistic aggression In evolutionary biology, reciprocal altruism is a behaviour whereby an organism acts in a manner that temporarily reduces its fitness while increasing another organism's fitness, with the expectation that the other organism will act in a similar ...
''; it has been observed in all species of
social animal Sociality is the degree to which individuals in an animal population tend to associate in social groups (gregariousness) and form cooperative societies. Sociality is a survival response to evolutionary pressures. For example, when a mother wa ...
s, leading evolutionary biologists to conclude that it is an
evolutionarily stable strategy An evolutionarily stable strategy (ESS) is a strategy (or set of strategies) that is ''impermeable'' when adopted by a population in adaptation to a specific environment, that is to say it cannot be displaced by an alternative strategy (or set o ...
, selected because it favors cooperative behavior.


Examples against sociobiological use

One criticism of the claim of all social animals being evolutionarily hardwired for punishment comes from studies of animals, such as the
octopus An octopus ( : octopuses or octopodes, see below for variants) is a soft-bodied, eight- limbed mollusc of the order Octopoda (, ). The order consists of some 300 species and is grouped within the class Cephalopoda with squids, cuttlefish, ...
es near
Capri Capri ( , ; ; ) is an island located in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the Sorrento Peninsula, on the south side of the Gulf of Naples in the Campania region of Italy. The main town of Capri that is located on the island shares the name. It has be ...
, Italy that suddenly formed communal cultures from having, until then lived solitary lives. During a period of heavy fishing and tourism that encroached on their territory, they started to live in groups, learning from each other, especially hunting techniques. Small, younger octopuses could be near the fully grown octopuses without being eaten by them, even though they, like other ''
Octopus vulgaris The common octopus (''Octopus vulgaris'') is a mollusc belonging to the class Cephalopoda. ''Octopus vulgaris'' is one of the most studied of all octopus species, and also one of the most intelligent. It ranges from the eastern Atlantic, extends ...
'', were cannibals until just before the group formation. The authors stress that this behavior change happened too fast to be a genetic characteristic in the octopuses, and that there were certainly no mammals or other "naturally" social animals punishing octopuses for cannibalism involved. The authors also note that the octopuses adopted
observational learning Observational learning is learning that occurs through observing the behavior of others. It is a form of social learning which takes various forms, based on various processes. In humans, this form of learning seems to not need reinforcement to o ...
without any
evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
ary history of specialized adaptation for it. There are also arguments against the notion of punishment requiring intelligence, based on studies of punishment in very small-brained animals such as
insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pa ...
s. There is proof of
honey bee A honey bee (also spelled honeybee) is a eusocial flying insect within the genus ''Apis'' of the bee clade, all native to Afro-Eurasia. After bees spread naturally throughout Africa and Eurasia, humans became responsible for the current cosm ...
workers with mutations that makes them fertile laying eggs only when other honey bees are not observing them, and that the few that are caught in the act are killed. This is corroborated by
computer simulation Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be deter ...
s proving that a few simple reactions well within mainstream views of the extremely limited intelligence of insects are sufficient to emulate the "political" behavior observed in
great ape The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the ...
s. The authors argue that this falsifies the claim that punishment evolved as a strategy to deal with individuals capable of knowing what they are doing. In the case of more complex brains, the notion of evolution selecting for specific punishment of intentionally chosen breaches of rules and/or wrongdoers capable of intentional choices (for example, punishing
human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, cultu ...
s for murder while not punishing lethal
virus A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Since Dmitri Ivanovsk ...
es) is subject to criticism from
coevolution In biology, coevolution occurs when two or more species reciprocally affect each other's evolution through the process of natural selection. The term sometimes is used for two traits in the same species affecting each other's evolution, as well ...
issues. That punishment of individuals with certain characteristics (including but, in principle, not restricted to mental abilities) selects against those characteristics, making evolution of any mental abilities considered to be the basis for penal responsibility impossible in populations subject to such selective punishment. Certain scientists argue that this disproves the notion of humans having a biological feeling of intentional transgressions deserving to be punished.


Scope of application

Punishments are applied for various purposes, most generally, to encourage and enforce proper behavior as defined by society or family.
Criminal In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in C ...
s are punished judicially, by
fines Fines may refer to: * Fines, Andalusia, Spanish municipality * Fine (penalty) * Fine, a dated term for a premium on a lease of land, a large sum the tenant pays to commute (lessen) the rent throughout the term *Fines, ore or other products with a s ...
, corporal punishment or
custodial sentence A custodial sentence is a judicial sentence, imposing a punishment consisting of mandatory custody of the convict, either in prison or in some other closed therapeutic or educational institution, such as a reformatory, (maximum security) psychi ...
s such as
prison A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, corre ...
; detainees risk further punishments for breaches of internal rules.
Child A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person young ...
ren, pupils and other trainees may be punished by their educators or instructors (mainly
parent A parent is a caregiver of the offspring in their own species. In humans, a parent is the caretaker of a child (where "child" refers to offspring, not necessarily age). A ''biological parent'' is a person whose gamete resulted in a child, a male t ...
s, guardians, or
teacher A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...
s, tutors and
coaches Coach may refer to: Guidance/instruction * Coach (sport), a director of athletes' training and activities * Coaching, the practice of guiding an individual through a process ** Acting coach, a teacher who trains performers Transportation * Coac ...
) – see
Child discipline Child discipline is the methods used to prevent future unwanted behaviour in children. The word ''discipline'' is defined as imparting knowledge and skill, in other words, to teach. In its most general sense, discipline refers to systematic ins ...
.
Slaves Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
, domestic and other servants are subject to punishment by their masters. Employees can still be subject to a contractual form of fine or
demotion A demotion is a compulsory reduction in an employee's rank or job title within the organizational hierarchy of a company, public service department, or other body. A demotion may also lead to the loss of other privileges associated with a more s ...
. Most hierarchical organizations, such as military and police forces, or even churches, still apply quite rigid internal discipline, even with a judicial system of their own (
court martial A court-martial or court martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of memb ...
,
canonical court An ecclesiastical court, also called court Christian or court spiritual, is any of certain courts having jurisdiction mainly in spiritual or religious matters. In the Middle Ages, these courts had much wider powers in many areas of Europe than be ...
s). Punishment may also be applied on moral, especially religious, grounds, as in
penance Penance is any act or a set of actions done out of repentance for sins committed, as well as an alternate name for the Catholic, Lutheran, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox sacrament of Reconciliation or Confession. It also plays a part ...
(which is voluntary) or imposed in a
theocracy Theocracy is a form of government in which one or more deities are recognized as supreme ruling authorities, giving divine guidance to human intermediaries who manage the government's daily affairs. Etymology The word theocracy originates fr ...
with a religious police (as in a strict
Islamic state An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic ter ...
like
Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
or under the
Taliban The Taliban (; ps, طالبان, ṭālibān, lit=students or 'seekers'), which also refers to itself by its state (polity), state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a Deobandi Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalist, m ...
) or (though not a true theocracy) by
Inquisition The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...
.


Hell as punishment

Belief that an individual's ultimate punishment is being sent by God, the highest authority, to an existence in
Hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location in the afterlife in which evil souls are subjected to punitive suffering, most often through torture, as eternal punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hell ...
, a place believed to exist in the after-life, typically corresponds to sins committed during their life. Sometimes these distinctions are specific, with damned souls suffering for each sin committed (see for example Plato's
myth of Er The Myth of Er is a legend that concludes Plato's ''Republic'' (10.614–10.621). The story includes an account of the cosmos and the afterlife that greatly influenced religious, philosophical, and scientific thought for many centuries. The story ...
or Dante's ''
The Divine Comedy The ''Divine Comedy'' ( it, Divina Commedia ) is an Italian narrative poem by Dante Alighieri, begun 1308 and completed in around 1321, shortly before the author's death. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature an ...
''), but sometimes they are general, with condemned sinners relegated to one or more chamber of Hell or to a level of suffering.


History and rationale


Seriousness of a crime; Punishment that fits the crime

A principle often mentioned with respect to the degree of punishment to be meted out is that the punishment should match the crime. One standard for measurement is the degree to which a crime affects others or society. Measurements of the degree of seriousness of a crime have been developed. A
felony A felony is traditionally considered a crime of high seriousness, whereas a misdemeanor is regarded as less serious. The term "felony" originated from English common law (from the French medieval word "félonie") to describe an offense that res ...
is generally considered to be a crime of "high
seriousness Seriousness (noun; adjective: ''serious'') is an attitude of gravity, solemnity, persistence, and earnestness toward something considered to be of importance. Some notable philosophers and commentators have criticised excessive seriousness, while ...
", while a
misdemeanor A misdemeanor (American English, spelled misdemeanour elsewhere) is any "lesser" criminal act in some common law legal systems. Misdemeanors are generally punished less severely than more serious felonies, but theoretically more so than adm ...
is not.


Possible reasons for punishment

There are many possible reasons that might be given to justify or explain why someone ought to be punished; here follows a broad outline of typical, possibly conflicting, justifications.


Deterrence

Two reasons given to justify punishment is that it is a measure to prevent people from committing an offence - deterring previous offenders from re-offending, and preventing those who may be contemplating an offence they have not committed from actually committing it. This punishment is intended to be sufficient that people would choose not to commit the crime rather than experience the punishment. The aim is to deter everyone in the community from committing offences. Some criminologists state that the number of people convicted for crime does not decrease as a result of more severe punishment and conclude that deterrence is ineffective. Other criminologists object to said conclusion, citing that while most people do not know the exact severity of punishment such as whether the sentence for murder is 40 years or life, most people still know the rough outlines such as the punishments for armed robbery or forcible rape being more severe than the punishments for driving too fast or misparking a car. These criminologists therefore argue that lack of deterring effect of increasing the sentences for already severely punished crimes say nothing about the significance of the existence of punishment as a deterring factor. Some criminologists argue that increasing the sentences for crimes can cause criminal investigators to give higher priority to said crimes so that a higher percentage of those committing them are convicted for them, causing statistics to give a false appearance of such crimes increasing. These criminologists argue that the use of statistics to gauge the efficiency of crime fighting methods are a danger of creating a reward hack that makes the least efficient criminal justice systems appear to be best at fighting crime, and that the appearance of deterrence being ineffective may be an example of this.


Rehabilitation

Some punishment includes work to reform and rehabilitate the culprit so that they will not commit the offence again. This is distinguished from deterrence, in that the goal here is to change the offender's attitude to what they have done, and make them come to see that their behavior was wrong.


Incapacitation

Incapacitation as a justification of punishment refers to the offender's ability to commit further offences being removed. Imprisonment separates offenders from the community, for example, Australia was a dumping ground for early British criminals. This was their way of removing or reducing the offenders ability to carry out certain crimes. The death penalty does this in a permanent (and irrevocable) way. In some societies, people who stole have been punished by having their hands amputated.


Retribution

Criminal activities typically give a benefit to the offender and a loss to the victim. Punishment has been justified as a measure of
retributive justice Retributive justice is a theory of punishment that when an offender breaks the law, justice requires that they suffer in return, and that the response to a crime is proportional to the offence. As opposed to revenge, retribution—and thus ret ...
, in which the goal is to try to rebalance any unjust advantage gained by ensuring that the offender also suffers a loss. Sometimes viewed as a way of "getting even" with a wrongdoer—the suffering of the wrongdoer is seen as a desired goal in itself, even if it has no restorative benefits for the victim. One reason
societies A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Societ ...
have administered punishments is to diminish the perceived need for retaliatory "street justice",
blood feud A feud , referred to in more extreme cases as a blood feud, vendetta, faida, clan war, gang war, or private war, is a long-running argument or fight, often between social groups of people, especially families or clans. Feuds begin because one pa ...
, and
vigilantism Vigilantism () is the act of preventing, investigating and punishing perceived offenses and crimes without legal authority. A vigilante (from Spanish, Italian and Portuguese “vigilante”, which means "sentinel" or "watcher") is a person who ...
.


Restoration

For minor offenses, punishment may take the form of the offender "righting the wrong", or making restitution to the victim.
Community service Community service is unpaid work performed by a person or group of people for the benefit and betterment of their community without any form of compensation. Community service can be distinct from volunteering, since it is not always performe ...
or compensation orders are examples of this sort of penalty. In models of restorative justice, victims take an ''active'' role in a process with their offenders who are encouraged to take responsibility for their actions, "to repair the harm they've done – by apologizing, returning stolen money, or community service." The restorative justice approach aims to help the offender want to avoid future offences.


Education and denunciation

Punishment can be explained by positive prevention theory to use the criminal justice system to teach people what are the social norms for what is correct, and acts as a reinforcement. Punishment can serve as a means for society to publicly express denunciation of an action as being criminal. Besides educating people regarding what is not acceptable behavior, it serves the dual function of preventing vigilante justice by acknowledging public anger, while concurrently deterring future criminal activity by stigmatizing the offender. This is sometimes called the "Expressive Theory" of denunciation. The
pillory The pillory is a device made of a wooden or metal framework erected on a post, with holes for securing the head and hands, formerly used for punishment by public humiliation and often further physical abuse. The pillory is related to the sto ...
was a method for carrying out public denunciation. Some critics of the education and denunciation model cite
evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
ary problems with the notion that a feeling for punishment as a social signal system evolved if punishment was not effective. The critics argue that some individuals spending time and energy and taking risks in punishing others, and the possible loss of the punished group members, would have been selected against if punishment served no function other than signals that could evolve to work by less risky means.


Unified theory

A unified theory of punishment brings together multiple penal purposes—such as retribution, deterrence and rehabilitation—in a single, coherent framework. Instead of punishment requiring we choose between them, unified theorists argue that they work together as part of some wider goal such as the protection of rights.


Criticism

Some people think that punishment as a whole is unhelpful and even harmful to the people that it is used against. Detractors argue that punishment is simply wrong, of the same design as " two wrongs make a right". Critics argue that punishment is simply
revenge Revenge is committing a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance, be it real or perceived. Francis Bacon described revenge as a kind of "wild justice" that "does... offend the law ndputteth the law out of office." P ...
. Professor Deirdre Golash, author of ''The Case against Punishment: Retribution, Crime Prevention, and the Law'', says: {{quote, We ought not to impose such harm on anyone unless we have a very good reason for doing so. This remark may seem trivially true, but the history of humankind is littered with examples of the deliberate infliction of harm by well-intentioned persons in the vain pursuit of ends which that harm did not further, or in the successful pursuit of questionable ends. These benefactors of humanity sacrificed their fellows to appease mythical gods and tortured them to save their souls from a mythical hell, broke and bound the feet of children to promote their eventual marriageability, beat slow schoolchildren to promote learning and respect for teachers, subjected the sick to leeches to rid them of excess blood, and put suspects to the rack and the thumbscrew in the service of truth. They schooled themselves to feel no pity—to renounce human compassion in the service of a higher end. The deliberate doing of harm in the mistaken belief that it promotes some greater good is the essence of tragedy. We would do well to ask whether the goods we seek in harming offenders are worthwhile, and whether the means we choose will indeed secure them.{{Cite web , url=https://www.questia.com/read/117883311/the-case-against-punishment-retribution-crime-prevention , title = The Case against Punishment: Retribution, Crime Prevention, and the Law - 2004, Page III by Deirdre Golash. {{dead link, date=July 2021 Golash also writes about
imprisonment Imprisonment is the restraint of a person's liberty, for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is " false imprisonment". Imprisonment does not necessar ...
: {{blockquote, Imprisonment means, at minimum, the loss of liberty and autonomy, as well as many material comforts, personal security, and access to heterosexual relations. These deprivations, according to Gresham Sykes (who first identified them) “together dealt 'a profound hurt' that went to 'the very foundations of the prisoner's being. But these are only the minimum harms, suffered by the least vulnerable inmates in the best-run prisons. Most prisons are run badly, and in some, conditions are more squalid than in the worst of slums. In the District of Columbia jail, for example, inmates must wash their clothes and sheets in cell toilets because the laundry machines are broken. Vermin and insects infest the building, in which air vents are clogged with decades' accumulation of dust and grime. But even inmates in prisons where conditions are sanitary must still face the numbing boredom and emptiness of prison life—a vast desert of wasted days in which little in the way of meaningful activity is possible.


Destructiveness to thinking and betterment

There are critics of punishment who argue that punishment aimed at intentional actions forces people to suppress their ability to act on intent. Advocates of this viewpoint argue that such suppression of intention causes the harmful behaviors to remain, making punishment counterproductive. These people suggest that the ability to make intentional choices should instead be treasured as a source of possibilities of betterment, citing that complex cognition would have been an evolutionarily useless waste of energy if it led to justifications of fixed actions and no change as simple inability to understand arguments would have been the most thrifty protection from being misled by them if arguments were for social manipulation, and reject condemnation of people who intentionally did bad things. Punishment can be effective in stopping undesirable employee behaviors such as tardiness, absenteeism or substandard work performance. However, punishment does not necessarily cause an employee to demonstrate a desirable behavior.{{Cite web, url=https://www.bizjournals.com/wichita/stories/1996/11/18/focus3.html, title=Punishment in the workplace creates undesirable side effects, last=Milbourn, first=Gene Jr., date=November 1996, access-date=November 21, 2018


See also

{{columns-list, colwidth=30em, *
Capital punishment Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that ...
**
Capital and corporal punishment in Judaism Capital punishment in traditional Jewish law has been defined in Codes of Jewish law dating back to medieval times, based on a system of oral laws contained in the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmud, the primary source being the Hebrew Bible. In ...
**
List of capital crimes in the Torah According to the Torah or Law of Moses, these are some of the offenses which may merit the death penalty. Religious practices * Sacrificing to gods other than Yahweh * Anyone who "giveth of his seed unto Molech" * Worshipping Baal Peor. The ...
**
List of methods of capital punishment This is a list of methods of capital punishment, also known as execution. Current methods Ancient methods Many of the former methods combine execution with torture, often intending to make a spectacle of pain and suffering with overtones of sadis ...
**
List of people burned as heretics This is a list of people burned after being deemed heretics by different Christian Churches. The list does not attempt to encompass the list of those executed by burning for other reasons (such as victims of witch hunts or other persecutions). ...
**
List of people executed for witchcraft This is a list of people executed for witchcraft, many of whom were executed during organized witch-hunts, particularly during the 15th–18th centuries. Large numbers of people were prosecuted for witchcraft in Europe between 1560 and 1630.Levac ...
** Religion and capital punishment *
Coercion Coercion () is compelling a party to act in an involuntary manner by the use of threats, including threats to use force against a party. It involves a set of forceful actions which violate the free will of an individual in order to induce a des ...
* Corporal punishment *
Devaluation In macroeconomics and modern monetary policy, a devaluation is an official lowering of the value of a country's currency within a fixed exchange-rate system, in which a monetary authority formally sets a lower exchange rate of the national curre ...
* Discipline (BDSM) *
Hudud ''Hudud'' (Arabic: ''Ḥudūd'', also transliterated ''hadud'', ''hudood''; plural of ''hadd'', ) is an Arabic word meaning "borders, boundaries, limits". In the religion of Islam it refers to punishments that under Islamic law (sharīʿah) are ...
*
Intimidation Intimidation is to "make timid or make fearful"; or to induce fear. This includes intentional behaviors of forcing another person to experience general discomfort such as humiliation, embarrassment, inferiority, limited freedom, etc and the victi ...
* ''
Nulla poena sine lege ''Nulla poena sine lege'' (Latin for "no penalty without law", Anglicized pronunciation: ) is a legal principle which states that one cannot be punished for doing something that is not prohibited by law. This principle is accepted and codified in ...
'' * Preventive state *
Suffering Suffering, or pain in a broad sense, may be an experience of unpleasantness or aversion, possibly associated with the perception of harm or threat of harm in an individual. Suffering is the basic element that makes up the negative valence of a ...
*
Telishment Telishment is an act by the authorities of punishing a suspect in order to deter future wrongdoers, even though they know that the suspect is innocent. If supporters of these theories believe in the effectiveness of telishment as a deterrent, oppone ...


Citations

{{Reflist


References

* {{cite EB1911 , wstitle=Punishment , volume=22 , page=653 , short=1
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – Punishment

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – Legal Punishment

Etymology Online
* {{cite book , author=Brooks, Thom , title=Punishment , publisher=Routledge , location=New York , year=2012 , isbn=978-0-415-85051-3 * {{cite journal , last1 = Gade , first1 = Christian , year = 2020 , title = Is restorative justice punishment? , journal = Conflict Resolution Quarterly , volume = 38 , issue = 3 , pages = 127–155 , doi = 10.1002/crq.21293 , doi-access = free * {{cite journal , last1 = Lippke , first1 = Richard , year = 2001 , title = Criminal Offenders and Right Forfeiture , journal = Journal of Social Philosophy , volume = 32 , issue = 1, pages = 78–89 , doi = 10.1111/0047-2786.00080 * {{cite encyclopedia, last=Mack, first=Eric , author-link=, editor-first=Ronald , editor-last=Hamowy , editor-link=Ronald Hamowy , encyclopedia=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism , chapter=Retribution for Crime, chapter-url=https://sk.sagepub.com/reference/libertarianism/n263.xml, url= https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC , doi=10.4135/9781412965811.n263 , year=2008 , publisher= Sage;
Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Ind ...
, location= Thousand Oaks, CA , isbn= 978-1412965804 , oclc=750831024, pages=429–431 * {{cite book , author=Zaibert, Leo , title=Punishment and retribution , publisher=Ashgate , location=Hants, England , year=2006 , isbn=978-0754623892


External links

{{wikiquote {{Wiktionary * {{cite IEP , url-id=punishme , title=Punishment * {{cite IEP , url-id=m-p-puni , title=The Moral Permissibility of Punishment {{Authority control Social philosophy Criminal justice